Equipment for transferring sheets with change of direction, in particular right angle transfer equipment, are used in systems for the automatic processing and delivering of documents. Typically, the documents previously printed on sheets in vertical and in movement in the sense of a long edge should be moved in the sense of the short edge, without change of orientation for following processing of folding and insertion into envelope.
It is known equipment for transfer sheets with change of direction, of the type above mentioned, comprising a box like structure with a mechanism of input, a mechanism of output for moving the sheets along a second direction and electromagnets actuatable for putting the entered sheets in engagement with the mechanism of output. The mechanism of input includes a series of rollers which move the sheets along a first direction up to a stop surface, with loss of engagement. The mechanism of output includes motorized rollers projecting from a surface of support of the entering sheet and upper pinch rollers connected with the electromagnets. When the leading edge of the entering sheet arrives at the stop surface, it is sensed by a photocell which enables the electromagnets to urge the pinch rollers downwardly to put the entered sheet against the motorized rollers for the transfer along the second direction.
An equipment of this known type requires the complete emerging of the entered sheet along the second direction before the entering of a following sheet. Therefore this known equipment is inherently slow, of limited flexibility and is unsuitable to be used in the current high velocity systems for the automatic processing of document.